Dear Family, Great Mates and Andre

If you care to look back through to Washington DC (California Dreaming: September) I have put relevant photos onto each posting. They are different pictures to those on the flickr page. I hope they give you a better feel of the trip.
Millyx

Back to Cusco...
Saturday was a typical November Cusquenian day: poured down one minute, got sunburnt the next. I went with the dutch lovelies to four inca ruins, beginning at Tambo Machay (Inca bathing site), and walking the 8 km back to Cusco visiting Pucapucara, Q'enko and finishing in Sacsayhuman. Sacsayhuman is constructed to represent a puma, a sacred animal to the Incas, with walls built at a certain point in a zigzag to represent the teeth and a small amphitheatre representing the eye. I believe this site was the Inca equivalent of Eaton. The young princes from surrounding tribes were sent here for education and training. The young man who shone became the Inca (Leader). Hopefully they had better stock to choose from than we do at our hotbeds of priviledge minus actual intelligence or talent. Back to the Inca Empire...The construction and intricacy of the Inca ruins is spectacular, unbelievable in fact, but of the four, Sacsayhuman reigns supreme with the Christo Blanco overlooking the city, like a Rio de Janerian 'mini-me'.



Unfortunately, I caught a cold, and even stopping in Jack's cafe for steaming hot chocolate and a gigantic portion of carrot cake (carrots = vitamin c) did not ward off the germs which eventually led to me losing my voice completely. It went high, it went low, it went... Not big or clever, but it did mean that I couldn´t answer any tricky spanish questions in class for a whole day.

And here's a photo of the dutch amazonian lovelies, Corinje and Maryn, on our walk re-enacting a scene from the dutch fable of Peter and the Dyke. There isn´t one of the three of us together because frankly the height differential is too tricky for most cameras...















I saw off H and Kate...I mean that in a nice way, possums. I went out with them and their friend Jimmy (or Himmy as he has affectionately become known in spanish speaking territories). They will be back in Watford in July.

I must tell you about an email I got concerning someone I know in Stafford (and it's not Peter...in fact he's the `spreader´ of this story...). This person thinks she is on the edge of dementia. She had an appointment at her hairdressers who is called Glenn Caddy. Realizing she had forgotten to get cash out of the bank (stage 1 of dementia duely noted), she asked of she could pay by cheque. Glenn replied, “Yes, of course, that's no problem, it's 2 N’s and 2 D’s". Transactions over she went home. The next day she opened her cheque book and realised that she had made the cheque out to Glenn Hoddle (stage 2). I was trying to have an afternoon nap and I woke myself up laughing!